


Escaping the Inevitable

by Nahmar



Category: One Direction
Genre: AU where Zayn has Cystic Fibrosis and Louis is bulimic and they meet in the ICU, An Liam is a dietician, And Zayn is the only person who will listen to Louis, And now Zayn knows that, Bottom Louis, Harry is a surgeon, It really isn't Louis fault, M/M, So Zayn steps in, So now zayn can help Louis out and be the only support system he's ever had, Top Zayn, Zayn tried to calm Louis down and Louis fights with his self image, who Louis hates with a passion because he doesn't think anything is wrong with him, who gives Zayn his new lungs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-17
Updated: 2015-08-28
Packaged: 2018-04-15 06:03:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4595658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nahmar/pseuds/Nahmar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn was living with cystic fibrosis. Louis was living with Bulimia, and just thought that the weight loss he was experiencing was somewhat normal to have. He never wanted to be diagnosed, much less taken into the emergency room late one Thursday night. He had a plane to catch! He never wanted to deal with the consequences of what would happen if he continued down his path. But now, they're both facing the consequences of what Louis had done to himself, and what Zayn's family never did for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. By Your Side

"I'm not ill, I'm not ill!" I heard someone shout as they were being wheeled in o gurney to the ICU. "I'm fine, let me go!" They put him in the room across from mine, and I sighed. I knew I wasn't going to be getting any sleep now. Whenever they brought in feisty patients, I never got any sleep. They always put me back in the ICU from outpatient when my coughs became bloody, but I never died. No matter how many times they called my birth family and my sisters and brothers came. Well, half siblings. It's complicated.

I rolled over in my bed and looked out the doorway from where I was sitting up in bed now, and watched as they moved him from the gurney to the hospital bed. I was watching them as he thrashed about and they put the restraints on him. I felt bad for the guy. I believed him, if no one else would. He deserved to be heard.

I made eye contact with a nurse, who huffed and shut my curtains with enormous force so that I couldn't watch them work on the boy. He looked around my age, and I felt bad for him. it wasn't fair that they weren't hearing him out. I wanted to be there for him and comfort him because no one else was going to. He didn't have any family with him, and I felt awful for the guy. It certainly wasn't fair that any of us had to be in here. but maybe he was put in here for good reason. Who knew?

Apparently they had started asking him questions, to which he responded with some frantic answers, his voice getting more and more high-pitched by the second. That was the problem with this place; it didn't have walls in the ICU. 

"No, I don't, I eat! I eat! I promise! I don't do anything to myself! I'm fine, please, let me go!" He begged and I felt some tears welling up in my eyes. I had seen it before. Teenagers come in for eating disorders and self harm and such, but I had never seen an adult. It was sad. I wondered what this man was going through.

They asked him a bunch more questions and they left his room, and he was alone. He answered them all cooperatively, but still falsely, and my curiosity was at a peak. So much so that I absolutely had to get out of this bed and go talk to the guy. 

I pulled my heart monitor pads off after I muted the beeps and then pulled my IV along with me as I made my small trek out towards his bedside. Though, it may have seemed like a short journey, but it was a big journey to me. It was going to take passing by valleys and climbing up mountains to get there without running out of breath. 

Since I had cystic fibrosis, it was hard to even move without running out of breath. So, yeah, this was going to be hard. It was going to take everything in me to get to the other side of the hall. But I was going to do it. I was going to wheel my oxygen tank and my IV fluids behind me and go to this guy's bedside. He needed someone. And I was going to be this someone. Even if it killed me. I would rather die determined to help someone else than doing nothing at all. 

But, I made it. I made it into his room, and I could hear him loud and clear when she yelled at me. I didn't back down, though. I was determined. I was not going to take orders from him right now. 

"Get out! Get away from me! I don't want anyone to see me like this!" He said, turning his head to see me sitting down in the chair beside his bed and beside his heart monitor. I held my chest up high and sat up straight to make sure I was breathing okay now. He looked down at me with his grey eyes, and I felt a shiver run through me. He was so skinny and small that it was a bit unnerving to know that he had let himself get like that. He was going to be in here for a while, I could tell that much. 

"Shhh, you'll get me caught!" I hissed at him, but backed down for a second. It's going to be okay. They wont hurt you here. They just want to help. So do I. I'm Zayn." I say, introducing myself and making sure he knew that I was okay and that he was going to be okay and that something was going to end up going his way at some point. 

"Zayn..." He mumbled out, and I could tell he had been sedated and they were starting to kick in now. That's probably why they had left. 

"That's a nice name. I like that. I'm Louis. I play footie. Or, played." He said and sighed. "I had gotten into an accident. A car accident, and it jacked up my leg. So, I had to quit. That's when I could tell In was gaining more and more weight. I had to stop. I didn't know what else to do. I-I'm not crazy!" He said, defending himself with tears in his eyes. God, I felt bad for the kid, who I would later find out is older than me. 

"You'll be okay. Everything is going to be okay. You're going to get back on your feet and you're going to get back to playing footie. Who did you play for?"

"D-Donny. I played for Doncaster. I was good, too. I was typically left wing or forward. I was damn good. I miss it so much. All I do now is sit at home and critique myself. It's awful." He said and sighed, letting a few tears pool in his eyes and finally relieve them and let them spill over. I felt so bad for him. I took his hand that was restrained and squeezed it gently. It was warm but bony. I could feel each individual bone and I couldn't tell that there was even a hint of muscle on those bones. It was concerning, and I just hoped that he would help himself out before he ended up really hurting himself. 

"Hey, look at me. Just think about getting back on that field, yeah? That beautiful green field with the goals. Remember that feeling of your cleats sinking into that field. Yeah, remember that?" he nodded, and I couldn't help but smile at him. 

"Mr. Malik! What are you doing out of your bed?! I went to do rounds and I almost had to call security on you!" My night nurse yelled as she saw me sitting in the chair, holding his hand. "You are not to talk to other patients! How many nights do we have to go over this?" She groaned and walked over to me, pulling me up to my feet and taking my oxygen tank handle and rolling it behind us as she aggravatedly lead me back across the hall. I felt my heart drop as he cried out again, wailing for me to come back, and I had to turn my head away from watching him. I felt awful for him. I was his only consolance. It was very depressing to watch, but I had to get back in my bed. 

Crawling back in my bed, I sighed as the nurse reattached my heart monitor patches to my chest and then walked back out after checking to make sure everything was in order. Listening to him wail was hard on me. Listening to him weep was even harder. It was destroying me. But i would see him tomorrow. I just didn't know it yet.


	2. When Will I See You Again?

There was some sort of commotion outside after I had finally gotten some sleep. Morning was on the horizon and I could tell that this was going to be a bit of a long day. I just knew it. How? I could feel it in my lungs. They were already aching and I had only walked across one hallway last night. I was just afraid that I wasn't getting any better any time soon. The haunting thought was stuck in my mind that I may be in a hospital permanently for the rest of my life until I got some new lungs. If I got some new lungs. 

I had been diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis when I was nineteen, and I had been living in and out of hospitals since I was twenty. It wasn't fair that a guy like me had to live with it. I still had art school to go to and I still had a life to live. But I was stuck here. Just like Louis. We were both stuck here against our will. It sucked. 

I had been on the donor list for new lungs for about two years now, and my name was finally getting close to the top of the list. I would only have to wait a little longer more for someone to die. It was probably cruel that I wanted someone to die so that I could take their pair of lungs, but I needed them so very badly. I couldn't go on without my lungs. I didn't want to die without the chance to try them out. 

That would be cruel. A god could not be that cruel to me. I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of him taking me away before I got my lungs. 

I groaned as a nurse came in to check my vitals and check out how I was doing. I was absolutely tired of people coming in to make sure that I was going to live for the next few days. I had no one but nurses to come check on me, and most of them were nice, but some just seemed to not even have a passion for the patients, but rather for their promotions or their discoveries. 

"You have someone requesting to talk to you." The nurse grinned once she finished up checking up on her exam where she would check my lungs, make sure my heart wasn't being overworked, and all sorts of other things that were pretty basic. 

"Yeah? Like who? No one ever wants to talk to me except my sister and she is with my parents who wont let her while they're in the house." I grumble bitterly, and she stood at the foot of the bed with a smile. 

"Just pick up the phone. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised." She grinned and left the room with a bit of a spring in her step. She was always a bubbly nurse, and I was lucky when I got her on my case. She always brought gum to me when I wasn't allowed, and all sorts of small things like that. It wasn't anything that would put me in harm, but it was the little stuff that kept my head up and kept me from getting depressed. I had seen what they did when they thought you were depressed in here. They brought in a psych consult and once you got better, they shipped you off to what they called "The pavilion", and you never saw them again for anything good. They just got worse until they ended up bringing themselves down to the darkest hole in the earth. It was a shame, really. And I wouldn't let them take me down to the pavilion. I absolutely would not. 

I picked up the phone and pressed my room number into the buttons, leaning over the right side of the bed, and then sitting back up in my bed a bit to listen to whoever the hell it was on the other end. 

"Hello?" I ask drowsily and sigh a bit, running a hand through my hair and watching as the blinking red light beside the buttons that you dialed to get the call. I couldn't place my finger on what it was called, but it immediately slipped my mind once I heard who was on the other end. 

"Hey, neighbor." He spoke, and I could almost hear his smirk on the other end of the phone. It was Louis. Well speak of the devil..

"H-Hey, Louis. You doing alright? Sleep well?" I say shakily, getting nervous. last night was weird for me. I had a passion to go out and introduce myself. Now.. I was shyer. I was timid. I couldn't talk without wheezing, and that wasn't hot at all. And Louis, from what I got a glimpse of him, was hot. He had a few tattoos on his left forearm, and I myself also had quite a few. They looked pretty cool, but I didn't get much of a view except when I was holding his hand last night. I could still feel the feeling of my hand in his. Dang. I mean, I was pansexual, so I was open to anyone of any sexuality and gender, but I had never actually been with a boy before. Well, a cisgender boy. I had been with transgender boys, but that was small little things in high school who were my best friends who wanted a date to homecoming. 

"Could you meet me at the hallway? I'm being told that some nurses might even let you sit out in the hallway. if you're in tip top shape. Which, I definitely am, and you seem to be functioning pretty fine." He said, but he was observing wrong. I was out of breath from speaking, and I could feel with each exhale of breath that my lungs were collapsing in my chest and then reinflating with each inhale. And that was on the oxygen. 

"I can try my best..." I wheeze out, and say a small little goodbye for now and hang up the phone. I rang the little buzzer for my nurse, and she came in with a smile on her face and sat back down on the edge of the bed. She was actually starting to aggravate me with her cheerfulness. 

"So, how was the phone call? I heard about your little rebellious adventure last night." She said and I grinned back a little smile back at her. 

"It's not over yet if you want to help me get into this wheelchair and help me out in the hallway." I say, and she went immediately to get it from the corner and unfold it and pull it over to my side. She put the oxygen tank in the little bag that held it on the back of the right handle, and she helped me out of the bed and into it, and pulled my IVs behind her as she rolled me into the hallway. It smelled like cleaning supplies and the knowings that half the people in here were getting morphine. If morphine had a smell, I would be telling you that I would have smelled it, but it doesn't. 

I saw as he was leaning on the wall with a cocky smirk on his face that he was indeed very thin. Extremely thin. There was nothing but a skeleton with some pale, peeling skin to him. His hair was thin and had less color than the normal person should, and he was extremely pale. His tattoos were faded because of his peeling skin, and it almost made me cringe. But I wasn't like everyone else. I was going to be on this guy's side. I was going to be the one person who was on his new team. 

His face was swollen and there was scars and bruises along his arms and collarbones that were jutting out of his skin. The smallest gown on him was extremely too big, and it made me want to cry. How could someone so beautiful let themselves live like this? It hurt me like I had a bullet shoot through my chest. Or maybe that was just the feeling of my lungs trying their very hardest to function, but they were on their last whim. If I didn't get my lungs soon, I would surely suffocate and die. Or be put on life support and be brain dead. I was afraid for my own life now. Shit.

He frowned when he saw me looking, and turned his head away angrily. "You're just like everyone else." He grumbled and let his dead hair fall in his face to hide the tears he was holding back. It was a pang on my heartstrings as I wheeled myself closer to him, taking his hand just like I did last night. 

"You're not though. You cared enough to call. You're the only person that has called me. My family has given up and won't travel to London until they call my time of death. You cared enough to want to see me again. You mustered up the courage to show yourself." I assure him and he looked down at me from where I was sitting in my chair under him. He raised his arm to brush the hair out of his face and he sniffed a little. 

I could feel a hard cough welling up in my throat but I kept it down because I didn't want all the nurses running to my side like they normally did. I didn't want to scare this guy off already. I could feel some connection with him. 

He chewed on his lip, cracking the thin skin and making it bleed, and he sighed, letting a few tears fall and I watched as he tried to compose himself. 

"To answer your previous questions, no, I didn't sleep good, and no, I'm not alright anymore. This place is breaking me already. They make me feel like a fuckin' freak." He whimpered and wiped his continuously flowing tears with his skinny arm, and I could see every vein that ran through his shoulder down to his fingers. It made me want to cry as well. 

"I know the feeling. I'm hooked up to so many machines, I feel like I'm part cyborg." I say with a smile, trying to cheer him up a bit. It didn't really work, but he did have enough in him to call me a dork. That made me smile even wider. 

"I just want to get out. I never meant to be the way I am. I just always struggled with my self-image. Ever since I was a teenager. I always thought I wasn't good enough. Maybe if my mother didn't have me in the first place she would still have a life. Maybe if I was thinner people would like me more. Maybe if I cut myself the pain would be released. No. No, it wouldn't. If I could go back and tell myself one thing, I would tell me not to screw myself over in the first place." He said through his tears that pooled in his eyes and through his eyelids once he shut his eyes tightly. 

"I had no one there for me. No one by my side. No one to talk to about my problems. I isolated myself to the point where I was completely alone. Every time I looked in the mirror I would want to throw up. Until I started forcing myself to. Then one thing lead to another. I stopped eating altogether. I was just drinking water and throwing that back up until I passed out last night and-" He said, cutting himself off with a sob.

I did something I hadn't done in so long. I did something that I would have never been able to do without him motivating me or giving me the strength. I stood up with my knees wobbling underneath me and my wheezing picking up. I outstretched my arms and wrapped them around his tiny, frail body and gave him a hug. I couldn't hug him tight, but I hoped it was the thought that mattered.

And it did. He had hugged me back. His tiny arms had wrapped around my torso long enough for me to run out of breath and have me fall back down in the wheelchair. I smiled up at him with a breathless laugh and he looked down at me worriedly. 

"It comes with the disease." I shrug a bit, trying to take long deep breaths through the nubbins in my nose that was supplying the proper amount of oxygen to my body. I was going to have to deal with this for the rest of my short life if I didn't get this surgery. And so far, it wasn't looking good. 

"Listen to me, Louis. You're going to be okay. You are going to be fine and you will get strong. Mentally and physically. I promise you. But right now I really need to lie down. Will you help me to my room?" I ask, and he nodded, taking me back across the hall and getting me back in my bed. 

"Zayn I-I don't know if I can.." He whimpers out as he sat down beside me on the tiny bed. 

"Stop it. You need to believe in yourself like I believe in you. I've seen people who are definitely worse off and they made it too, okay? Look at me." I say, reaching my cold hand up and pressing it against his warm face to turn it so our eyes met. "You've got this."

The nurse came in to take Louis back to his room, and I waved him goodbye and gave him my actual cellphone number for him to text me and call me from in case he needed me again. I was just thankful that these nurses were so nice. Because I knew it wouldn't be happening again. Unless..

"Zayn, the call button is only for emergencies! Are you breathing alright?" The nurse asked as she had ran in here. There obviously must have been a shift change because she wasn't one of the ones from before. 

"Look, Louis Tomlinson isn't going to get better unless he has a support system. I assume that you heard about what I did last night?" I ask, and she nodded slowly. "I'm telling you, I need you to put in a good word to my doctor and tell him that I'm doing good on the oxygen and that I can room with other patients. Especially Louis. This is an emergency. he's going to waste away on your hands if he doesn't get the proper support." I try to convince her, and she sighs, and gets up from the bed. 

"I can't do that, Zayn. I'm sorry. But I guess I will try to set you a time every day to see each other. How does that sound?" She asked, and I nodded, but was still slightly disappointed. I couldn't help but be disappointed. I wanted to see him all the time and be able to talk to him. We both didn't have support systems, and we needed each other. What didn't they understand about this?

She left and I took my phone out of my pocket as I heard it ding, and I saw the text from Louis. 

'Thank u <3'


	3. Nirvana

He held my hand with his fingers tracing over the outline of the bird tattoo on my hand. His fingernails were chipped and dead from him being so thin, but I didn't even look at them. I was too focused on the look on his face as we filled out the paperwork, each with one hand. Both of our doctors had approved of us rooming together, and since we were both older than eighteen, we had the choice to do it in private, so we did. As scary as it was, my doctor had called down Psych to make sure I mentally checked out okay enough to be with him. I had and everything was being approved. 

We were going to be sharing a room together. The moment had come after five days of us fighting with the doctors and nurses and Psych. It was mainly Louis' dietitian that was completely against the idea. He didn't think Louis needed any encouragement, but I knew he did. His body was refusing the food that the hospital was giving him, and that was absolutely not his fault, but they blamed him anyways and yelled at him for it every time. I was getting tired of hearing them yelling at him down the hall, so I had stepped in and had to call his dietitian down to explain to the nurses that until his stomach would grow bigger, his body would reject the food. So, every day, little by little, his stomach would expand to be normal size again eventually. And then they could put him on a diet plan and then send him back home again. But this time it would be different. He wouldn't go back to becoming the way he was now. He would have me to talk to and confide in. I would always be there for him. 

Holding his hand was like heaven and I never wanted to let go. I knew that patients were not supposed to become romantically involved, and I understood that we were taking this too fast, but maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. I mean, if he wanted it too. 

Sniffing in the pure oxygen in through my nose, I sighed out a breath in an exhale afterwards. I knew that this would be a good outcome. I could feel it. i just.. I knew it. The way he looked at me and the way he talked to me when he called from just one room over every day. It was a big enough hint. 

"You alright there?" He asked in a whisper, and I nodded. 

"Lungs just ache. I wish they could give me more painkillers." I say, fidgeting with the tube around my face and making sure it was secure. I had to check every so often because it constantly felt like I couldn't get enough oxygen to fill my lungs. They could never get filled or function properly. I was just waiting for the day that my doctor would come in and tell me, "Today is the day, Zayn. Today you're getting your new lungs." 

But I knew it wasn't going to come any time soon. I was number thirty seven on the list of transplants. They were just waiting for me to die so they could stop using up all their oxygen and medications. I knew it. We all knew it. That's why my family had stopped bothering to call or stop by to check on me. It was so far away from Bradford, but if it was them, I would have made the trip. But they didn't care. I was that old relative that was sick for so long and they would just wait on to die. it was sad but true. When I died I would become the relief. It would be a relief for all of us. I would be dead and have a new set of lungs in the heavens above, and then I could breathe, and they would have a peace of mind instead of worrying so much about me. It would all be great. 

Though now, I was filling out some paperwork to assure that I wouldn't die completely alone. I would pass on with another person, another guy by my side, holding my hand the whole way to the light. I would be able to have someone holding onto me, crying over me. As selfish as that sounded, that's what I wanted the most. I just wanted someone to care about me like I cared about them. And I had found that someone. I had found Louis. 

"Louis, I want you to know that I'm not going to be around for much longer and-"

"Shut up." he mumbled as he was looking down at the stack of papers on a clipboard he was putting his signature on and flipping through sloppily. 

"Lou, I'm telling you, I'm not-"

"I said shut up, Zayn. I wouldn't be putting myself in this situation if I didn't realize how ill you are, okay? I realize all the risks and all the complications that could happen. I-I want to do this. I want to be by your side through all of this. I promise I won't run away." He says, and looks over at me, squeezing my hand. 

I knew he meant it, so I didn't question it and went back to filling out the forms until I was finished. The nurses were bringing my stuff to a different room and were doing the same with Louis' things as well, and I was content with how fast we were taking this. Though we could never be normal, This was like the first step of building a life together. We were there for each other. That was and is step one. No matter how fast you take it, it will be step one and I can guarantee you that when you find the right person, they will be happy to be sharing the support with you.

"Kiss me." 

"What?!" He blurted out, dropping the stack of papers he had been holding. They spread all over the floor, flying all over the place, and he sighed aggravatedly. 

"You heard me." I say, and crawl up on the bed, taking both of his hands in mine, arms bumping against arms, tattoos on tattoos, skin on skin, lips on lips. 

Pressing his lips to mine, I closed my eyes instinctively and savored the moment, the texture, the everything. It was too late to go back and I knew I wanted to give this kiss to him. I wanted to give our first kiss to this moment. I wanted to present to him my affection and true underlying feelings to him before something happened. I didn't want anything to happen without knowing that he felt the same. It felt like red rose petals on a white tablecloth at a wedding rehearsal. It felt like butterfly kisses with a touch of stubble brushing against my cheeks. It felt like a good morning kiss with the most intimate touches on your skin. God, it felt like heaven.

His hands moved down to my hips and he pulled me close to the point where I was laying on top of him, but with only a little bit of my weight. I didn't want to hurt him by crushing him, so I had to lean on my right side a bit more than what was comfortable. It was worth it to be touching him though. To finally have moved on from something that was other than a simple fingers laced within other fingers. 

I had been avoiding commitment for way too long, and now that I was finally letting myself open up, my heart was aching almost as strong as the ache in my lungs just knowing that it may not last forever. It may only last a few more days, maybe even less if everything went spiraling down. I couldn't let that happen. like he was trying for me, I had to try for him, even though I couldn't even help it on my own. 

He pulled away with a smile on his lips and he pulled me closer towards him so my head was resting on his chest where I could feel each individual rib. He trailed his fingers through my black hair and smiled down at me. 

"So I-"

"You don't have to say anything. I already know." I smiled and he just smirked back at me and then rested his head back against the white pillows and shut his eyes, continuing to play with my hair. It felt nice. I loved it when people played with my hair. It was a wonderful feeling, honestly. I couldn't get over it one bit. It was perfect.

We laid there for a while before my doctor came in and requested to see me privately. I wasn't worried because we hadn't done much of anything wrong, so there was no sense in worrying over nothing. 

I lifted myself down off the bed and back into the wheelchair and made my way out into the hallway with Dr. Styles. He was a great doctor and seemed like he actually cared about his patients other than just cutting into his patients and getting the credit for a successful surgery. I liked him a lot as my doctor and I knew he would have good news by the way he was standing. It was simple body language that always helped me analyze situations like this. You learn a lot while you're in a hospital.

"Zayn, I have some good news for you." He said with a curling grin on the edges of his rosy lips, and I nodded. 

"Alright, hit me."

"I've noted to the board about your declining health over the past month, and we all agreed that it would be best if we bumped you up on the list to number five. Which means, if someone comes in brain dead and the family finally decides to let go, and they meet all the requirements for being a donor, you'll get your new set of lungs." He told me, and I could have just jumped out of my chair right then and there to give him a hug, if I didn't know better, that is. 

"Even without the insurance?" I ask with a smile forming from ear to ear. 

"Even without the insurance." He assured me, putting a hand on my shoulder. He was a bit taller than me standing up, but sitting down especially. I had to look up to him to talk to him from the wheelchair. "We're doing the surgery pro-bono. Which means, it'll be paid for by the hospital since we know your conditions are deadly and that you don't have much time left with us unless you get those lungs." He said, and I nodded in understanding. I couldn't help but be extremely grateful to him and the hospital for having it covered for me. That was insane! I was so thankful. But on the other hand, it was awful of me to wish that someone would get in a horrible accident and give me their lungs. Was it wrong? Of course. Did I care? No. I was getting new lungs. 

"Thank you, doctor, thank you thank you thank you!" I say excitedly and see Louis come out from behind the curtain to see what was taking so long. 

"Sorry, I uh, I'll see you in the new room." He said, and left us as a nurse escorted him down the hall to an actual room that we would be sharing together now. 

"What if I somehow got insurance? How much would it cover of the surgery?" I ask, watching him walk down the hall, his hip bones jutting out and his legs barely able to hold himself up.

"Well, that depends on what insurance company you signed up with." He says and removes his hand from my shoulder, causing me to look up at him again. 

"Alright, well, thanks Dr. Styles. For everything. It means a lot." I assure him. I could promise him right here and now that I wouldn't be misusing my lungs or taking anything about them for granted. I had lived for so long in this hell that I was definitely not going to be putting them to waste. I was going to go out and live a good life. I knew it. There was no way in hell I was going to ever use these for anything besides breathing.

He nodded and walked off to go see his other patients for the day, and left me alone in the hallway. I had to take a moment to think about everything. Louis and I were becoming something, I was next on the list for lungs, everything was looking up for me. Until I wheeled myself back and heard someone retching in the bathroom of our room. I got up from the wheelchair immediately and hurried my steps towards the bathroom and fell down on my knees beside Louis to see that he was throwing up blood. I was scared and I didn't know what to do. I held his hair out of his face and ran my hand up and down his back. 

"Someone get a doctor in here! Please!"


	4. Don't Judge Me

Hospitals force you to conquer your fears like no other place in the world. They stick you with needles, prick you with fluid intakes, and call down psych to consult with you. All of which, they did to me today. The room was all hazy from all the pain medicine they had pumped in me, and they wanted to make sure that with Louis being gone in surgery, I would be okay. So they would be brining down psych to talk about our relationship. I was going to hate this.

They had sent down a blonde fellow with ocean blue eyes. His hair was sprayed upwards a bit and his roots were brown and his face held onto that type of youth only people born with it could attain. It was a kind of look that was one of a kind. A look that said that he was young and he was amounting to great things. And I was believing that.

"Hello, Zayn?" He asked, knocking on the heavy wooden door that was opened about halfway. He was thin enough to slip through and then close the door behind him. He had a cup of coffee from the lounge in his hand, and a small smile on his face. I must have been the calmest patient he had to deal with today. I was glad to give him a break. 

"Yeah, that's me." I say back, tired and groggy from the medicine. 

He pulled up the seat for the visitors beside the bed and scooted it closer to me and sat down, crossing his legs and setting his coffee down on the floor. He folded his hands in his lap nearly, and smiled at me, looking directly in my eyes, trying to study me and find my true emotions. To be honest, it was all just fear. I didn't want to be admitted to the psych ward.

"So, Zayn, why don't you tell me your side of the story of what happened yesterday? I want to get to know your views on everything and see how you saw it." He said. He was Irish. You could just tell it from his accent. He seemed fairly genuine and honest, so I didn't mind being open with this dude. 

"Man, I don't know. It was.. Scary. I mean, he was fine one minute and then completely destroyed the next." I say, and take a deep breath before continuing. It was hard to all about, but I needed to accept the facts. And the facts were he was not okay. He was probably not going to be okay. He was probably going to die on that operating table in an hour. He was going to leave me. I hadn't noticed my tears until now. "H-he was throwing up blood, a-and I called for help. They forced me out of the room and my lungs started to just collapse. It's like, it's like as if my body knew that he wasn't going to be okay." I say, and sigh. I hadn't seen him since yesterday. I had only gotten updates from doctors, and he had gotten updates from doctors about me. Cause I could hear him shout through a mouthful of blood my name. And that was the most horrifying sound I had ever heard. 

The therapist by the name of Niall nodded and gave me a moment to pause and try to compose myself. I sniffled and sucked up all the tears and then looked at him with my brown eyes for some sort of reassurance that it was okay to be crying. And he gave it to me with that sympathetic look. I appreciated it a lot more than he may have known. 

"So tell me, Zayn, what kind of relationship do you and Mr. Tomlinson have?" He asks. The dreaded question. The question that I knew all the staff were wondering. The question that could bring us closer or put Louis and I apart. I was very scared that something bad would come out of this. But that was just me being afraid. God only knows what could happen, right?

"I believe it is an unspoken relationship. We are happy in each other's presence, we support each other through all of this. I mean, I know it has to be some case of love at first sight, but I am absolutely sure that if we both got better, we could make a true life with each other." I say, and he nods, resting his chin on the back of his hand. 

We talked for a bit longer about my past with my family and all of that, and then we got onto the weather. I don't know how, but we did. 

"What do you think about winter?" He asked me, and I shrugged, looking out the window. It was November, and November was grey. It was gloomy with clouds and the occasional snow flurry that wasn't good enough to stick to the ground, but enough to annoy you on your way home from the grocery store. 

"It's annoying. An inconvenience. It's.. Depressing." I conclude and look back at him, and he nods, taking out a notepad from his shirt pocket and a pen that had been holding onto the pocket the whole time. He wrote something down and looked back at me and began to explain to me why I felt that way every year.

"It's called Seasonal Affective Disorder. Otherwise known as S.A.D. No one really knows exactly why some people feel that way during the seasons, but it just happens. It's all about the change of the seasons and our ability to open our minds and be just a little more optimistic." He says, and then begins again. "I'm goi g to write you a prescription for Prosaic and Abilify. It will bring your mood up and keep it stable. If you have any questions, please, don't hesitate to call me or the pharmacist." He says, and gets up out of the seat, putting it back. "And I'll put in a good word so hopefully you can see Louis before his surgery today." He says.

Louis had been taken into surgery yesterday since his stomach has been eating itself since it had no food. I had been encouraging him to eat, but he just wouldn't do it. I didn't understand it. I just couldn't. I would never be put in a similar situation to where I would even begin to understand what he had put himself through all these years.

A nurse has come in and offered to take me to Louis' new room where he was isolated in the ICU again by himself, leaving me and a lonely bed. I had said yes, and she wheeled me into his room, and he was sort of sitting up, his eyes closed, listening to some woman talk, she was sitting in the seat meant for guests, and I was wondering what a nurse was doing after her shift sitting there in a patient's room. 

Her hair was messy and blonde, her eyes a dull boring blue, unlike Louis'. Her lips were pursed as she saw me being wheeled into the room, my face mask over my face, and she frowned significantly as she looked me over. I didn't know who she was, but she did not have the right to just judge me based off looks and my condition status. 

"Zayn!" Louis called out as he saw me, and he smiled weakly, obviously exhausted. He was going to be having a kidney transplant today, since he hadn't been getting the nutrients he needed, and one of his kidneys had just completely shut down. I felt awful for him. He must have been through a lot of pain and hadn't told anyone. Though, I would find out soon enough that there was a lot he didn't or doesn't tell about his private life.

"Hey, Lou." I say in a wheeze, tired from just sitting straight up. Dr. Styles was right, I was deteriorating quickly. And that was truly terrifying.

"Louis, who is this?" The woman asked, holding onto his hand with a death grip. I was afraid that she was going to break his fingers with that amount of force on such a frail man. 

"That's Zayn. The man I was telling you about? He's been an amazing help." Louis said. 

"Thank you for being here for my boyfriend." The woman said sincerely and smiled at me. It was obvious she was a smoker from her yellowing teeth. 

But that wasn't what I was hung up on. I was exceptionally hung up on the fact that he had a girlfriend. Was he even gay? What was going on? I wanted to cry right here and now. I had been screwed over too many times in relationships to stand for this. 

"Louis, c-can you explain to me, please?" I ask, hanging my head ever so slightly, not being able to look him in the eyes. I just couldn't bring myself to look into his now happy blue eyes. 

"She's not my girlfriend." He assured me, and I felt a weight come off my shoulders which made my breathing become much easier. 

"She's the mother of my baby." He sighed, holding his head in his hands, and I felt my heart completely drop, and my chest just collapsed, causing me to just not be able to breathe for a couple of seconds. 

"You have a child?! How could you not tell me? Do you even want to be with me?!" I shout at him, tears running down my face. I felt like a crybaby, but that was okay. Crying didn't always mean you were weak. You were strong if you could show your emotions well. Or at least, that's what I thought people should think.

"Having a child. Briana is four months pregnant." He says. And that's all he said. That was it. He didn't try to assure me that he was gay. He didn't tell me that of course I was his boyfriend. He just.. Looked down at his hands. It broke my heart. My poor, over working heart. 

"You're gay?" She asked him, and he just kept his head down. He didn't confirm or denying, he just sat in silence. 

"You are disgusting, Louis!" She shouted, getting up from her chair and grabbing her purse and taking it with her as she stormed out of the room, but stopping in the doorway to make one more statement.

"I knew you would ruin yourself the moment you took off your shirt that night. You were way too skinny!" She shouted at him and ran off, heels clicking against the floor.

I wouldn't have called her the bad guy in the situation if it wasn't for her being an extreme homophobe. I would have blamed Louis for not telling me anything about his personal life when I had told him almost everything about mine. It wasn't fair. He wasn't fair. 

I wheeled myself over to him where he still had his head in his hands, and I sighed, taking the seat she had been sitting in beside his bed. "You need someone right now." I say when he glanced over at me with a questioning look on his face that asked why I was still here. 

"I'm not going to leave someone in need." I say stubbornly and smile a little as he took my hand in his. 

"I was going to tell you yesterday before everything happened, but then everything started happening at once and I got scared and.. I'm sorry. You deserve to know everything. You told me everything and it's poor on my part if I don't return the favor." He says.

"You just need rest right now. You're about to have a very big surgery and you need to be as rested as possible." I say, wiping the tears from my cheeks. 

To tell the truth, I just couldn't see him right now. I couldn't see him as the man I loved. I could only think about how many more secrets he had. 

Monogamy is supposed to be realistic. A couple of two. But now, I wasn't so sure. I now knew I wasn't the only one. Who else had he lied about me to?


End file.
